Page 31 of Savage Desires

He cups my face and presses his forehead to mine. "You'll always be safe with me. Always."

Kisten stands by my side through the entire exam. Dr. Wolfe is professional and quick. Which I'm grateful for because having my feet up in stirrups with someone's face in my vag sucks.

"Everything looks healthy despite the scarring. I should have the results from the pap tomorrow. Are you on birth control?"

My brain pushes away the comment about scarring. I don't want to think about if I look deformed down there. I have other scars on my body, but something about the thought of scars there makes me feel ashamed. I don't want to answer the question about birth control. It's another thing that I've done my best to not dwell on over the years.

"No," I say shortly.

"Any possibility you could be pregnant?" she asks, keeping her tone professional and light.

I clutch Kisten's hand. "I can't get pregnant. I was sterilized when I was taken."

His grip tightens, and his entire body tenses. I can feel the anger radiating from him. I want to tell him it's okay, but I know it isn't. Nothing about doing that to a person is okay. Though I witnessed several forced abortions and a few miscarriages in my time as a sex slave, I can honestly say going through either of those is more horrifying than being sterilized.

Dr. Wolfe does an excellent job keeping her expression neutral, though I can see the turmoil in her eyes. I have a feeling she's seen a lot of stuff she wishes she could unsee while doing this job. I can't imagine how hard it is for someone who has dedicated their life to helping people heal to see such horrors.

"How old were you?" she asks.

"Around seventeen… I'm not completely sure. I was on the shot for a while before they removed my fallopian tubes."

Kisten's grip tightens again. "How old were you when you were taken?"

"It was five days after my sixteenth birthday."

"Fuck. Jesus, fuck," he growls, dropping my hand and pacing the length of the room.

"So young," Dr. Wolfe murmurs, her professional mask dropping. "How old are you?"

"I'm twenty-one… close to twenty-two, I think."

"When is your birthday?"

"June 13th."

"Next month, then," Dr. Wolfe replies.

"Are you done here?" Kisten gruffly asks.

"Yes, we're all done. I'll send Gladys with food for both of you," Dr. Wolfe says. She strips off her gloves and leaves the room.

Kisten picks me up from the exam table and carries me upstairs instead of to the room I was in before. He places me on the bed, helping me get comfortable against the pillows. I try to run my hand through my hair, but it gets snagged. I try to work my fingers through the knots, then realize it's not just knots. It feels like it's caked in something. It takes a moment for me to grasp what it could be—blood.

I was covered in the blood of the man who tried to kill me. I've been strong up until now. The thought of being covered in his blood has me spiraling. My lungs constrict, and I let out a pained sound like a dying animal. It hurts my throat, but I can't stop.

"Get it off," I whimper, wiping my hands over my face and hair as if that will do anything to clean me.

Kisten grabs my wrists in a gentle but firm hold. "Calm down, beauty."

I let out a maniacal-sounding laugh. Hasn't he ever heard that you don't tell a woman to calm down when they are upset? Tears streak down my face as the laughter rips through my damaged throat.

"Calm down?" I choke out. "I'm covered in blood! I almost died… calm dow—" my words cut off with a sob.

The next thing I know, I'm wrapped up in Kisten's arms. He pulls me onto his lap and holds me close, whispering soothing words, though I have no idea what they are. The cadence of his tone is enough to soothe the raging storm that's built inside me. It seems fitting that after everything I've been through, the thing that throws me over the edge is safety.

If I were back in the cage or locked in my room at Mecca, I would be calm and reserved. It was how I survived: withdrawing into myself and forcing down any feelings, keeping them bottled up and only letting myself feel them in the dark recesses of my mind. I hate that I'm safe, and that's what breaks me.

Safe is an unknown variable to me. What'll happen next? How will I go back to a normal life when I've been unequivocally changed? I don't know what to expect, and that's terrifying.